Older, Wiser, Stronger
by StoneWingedAngel
Summary: Birthdays of GERTI's crew, and how they've changed over time.
1. Carolyn

Carolyn is twelve, and Ruth is ruining everything.

Ruth knows exactly how to ruin something. She knows how to get Carolyn angry enough to grind in frustration; she knows when to step back and let the heat fall on someone else; she knows when to step forward and cut Carolyn out.

Today, she's doing it all.

Right now she's stealing the spotlight perfectly, even surrounded by people who were supposed to be Carolyn's friends. Ruth sits like a queen in the circle, neatly unwrapping the last – the winning – layer of pass-the-parcel. Carolyn had protested endlessly before the party started that everyone was too old for pass-the-parcel, but Ruth had insisted that it was her favourite and they had to play it.

"But it's my day," Carolyn had said, not able to keep the whine out of her voice.

"Exactly," her mother had given her a stern look. "It's your day, so let Ruth have the one game."

It's never the one game. It's never the one anything with Ruth, and only Carolyn can see it.

The prize underneath the final layer of paper is a box of chocolates, and Ruth offers it around Carolyn's friends with winning grace. Carolyn perches on the edge of her chair, wishing that she has the coolness of mind to slouch, act as if she doesn't care, as if the whole game is beneath her.

She can't – she's too angry to do anything but lean forward and glare, holding her stomach so tense that her guts feel like they're being crushed.

"Don't be sour," their mother says, scooting past with a plate of sandwiches. "This is your day. Just let Ruth have her moment."

Carolyn doesn't say that Ruth is making it a day of moments, all of them for Ruth. She learned a long time ago not to say anything, because if their mother hates anything, it's selfishness.

So she sits crunched on the chair, gritting her teeth until she can plaster a neutral expression on her face, knowing that the whole day will be the same and that there isn't a thing she can do about it.

* * *

Carolyn is sixty-three, and Ruth has certainly stolen the day. Fifteen years is a long time, and Carolyn had forgotten how loud Ruth can be – how she can suck the air of a room into her lungs and expel it so that her audience can't do anything but pay attention.

But now Ruth is in Helsinki, more than a thousand miles away.

The four of them gather into the office, which is listing rather alarmingly to the side in the stiff breeze, blissfully alone with nothing but the sound of the wind rattling outside. Carolyn sticks the kettle on and scrubs her hands to get rid of the smell of fish and tobacco. Arthur arranges orchids in a blue plastic jug. Martin does paperwork. Douglas pretends to do paperwork.

No-one mentions Ruth at all. Not even to complain about her.

They finish tea and paperwork and head into the wind together. Douglas wishes Carolyn a happy birthday – "what's left of it" – as he goes. Martin gives her an awkward smile and wave, but she isn't offended because awkward is how Martin lives his life and Carolyn's got so used to it that she hardly notices any more.

"Ready to go, mum?" Arthur says, giving the orchids a final check – Carolyn has decided to leave them in the office, because they'll cheer her up when she comes in early tomorrow. "I'll cook."

Carolyn resists the urge to wince. "No need, dear. We'll go out, for a treat. I'm sixty-three, after all."

Besides, there is no way in Hell she's risking Arthur's cooking. Not on her birthday.

It's only when they're almost home, Arthur twittering excitedly about calzone, that Carolyn realises she hasn't thought about Ruth in hours.

* * *

 **Hello all! I know it's been a long time since I uploaded anything - my last year of uni is pretty hectic, but this fic's all written out so updates should be regular.**

 **Thanks for reading, feedback welcome.**

 **To be continued.**


	2. Douglas

Douglas is five, and everyone knows it.

His parents know. The neighbours know. The postman, the lady in the shop, and the man who stopped next to Douglas to tie his shoelaces know. Five is a big number, and Douglas is ready to burst with pride.

"I'm five now," he says to Graham, who sits next to him in maths. "When are you five?"

"Not until summer." Graham doesn't sound disappointed, and Douglas is surprised. Waiting until summer? He can't imagine that.

"I'm five now," he says to Sally, who sits next to him in art, her long blonde pigtails draping in the red paint. "When are you five?"

Sally gives him a high-nosed, raised-eyebrow look. "I'm already five. I was five a whole month ago."

Douglas pretends that he doesn't hear that.

That night there's his favourite meal and a cake with five candles and a big blue icing number five on it. There are even five chairs around the table, and even though Douglas knows that there are always five chairs around the table, he feels like it's all part of the day.

"How old are you?" he asks his mum when she's tucking him in bed with a little more force than usual, working hard to stop him from wriggling.

"It's rude to ask a lady's age," she says, with a huff and a smile. "You'll want to remember that, when you get older."

"You mean you don't people to know how old you are?"

His mum smiles again – a tired smile that makes the lines around her eyes look like bird's footprints in the snow. "When you get to my age, you won't want to tell anyone either."

Douglas can't understand that – can't understand not being excited about a birthday. Being five is great, but being older, as old as his mum or his dad, must be even more exciting.

"But mum-"

"Go to sleep." She kisses his forehead, finally getting him to lie still. "You'll understand, one day."

"No I won't," Douglas says, frowning. "Birthdays are great."

She gives him another kiss – 'for luck' – and leaves without speaking.

* * *

Douglas is fifty-five, and hasn't told a soul.

Fifty had been bad enough. At least when he was fifty he had a wife and a daughter and he was the captain of an aeroplane which had working no-smoking signs and engines that didn't threaten to give out every half-hour. A plane where the food was just bad, rather than a deadly concoction of the steward's wild imagination.

Helena leaving hasn't helped. Douglas has seen the tai-chi teacher, once or twice. He keeps telling himself that he's not much younger than Douglas. No more than ten years. Ten measly years.

Suddenly, it feels like a lifetime.

He glances across the cockpit at Martin – Martin with his fresh thirty-three years, and his bright hair and freckles that make him look even younger. Douglas has never been jealous of Martin before – certainly not of the way Martin _looks_ – but now age-gap starts to nag at his thoughts.

Martin won't say anything bad if Douglas were to tell him it's his birthday – were to mention in passing, 'hey chief, I might be wrong, but I think today is my birthday. This makes me feel fifty-five. One thing we could do is go out celebrate. How does that sound to you?' Martin will blush and stammer and say 'Douglas, you didn't tell me, I haven't got you a present' and Douglas will brush it off and everyone will go for a drink and maybe a meal and nothing will change, except that Martin and the others will know how old Douglas is. He hasn't been excited for a birthday since he was a student and 'birthday' basically meant 'get horribly drunk', but he's never felt ashamed of his age before now. He's not used to feeling ashamed.

He feels old. He doesn't think he's ever felt so old.

The rest of the flight only leaves him feeling more out of sorts, and by the time they land all he wants to do is go home. He doesn't pretend to do paperwork. He doesn't take the time to wind Martin up. He doesn't even say goodbye. He just leaves.

The drive home is long and lonely, and the house is dark and cold. Douglas reheats leftover chili for the third night in a row – usually he likes to cook, but he hasn't felt like it of late – and drinks orange juice. He wishes that it was something stronger. He misses Helena. He makes a cup of tea. He thinks about the number fifty-five and how big and scary it is, how close it seems to even scarier numbers like 'seventy' and 'eighty'. The tap drips at regular intervals, like a heartbeat.

Douglas is on his second cup of tea, perched on the barstool with his cold, half-eaten chili in front of him, when the doorbell rings.

Douglas knows who it is – only Arthur can ring a bell so rapidly, with so much enthusiasm, in such a short space of time. Douglas shuffles to the door, noting the time on the clock over the oven. It's late. He hopes nothing is wrong. The thought of anything being _wrong_ – with Carolyn, with Martin – makes his skin prickle as his hand closes on the handle, but Arthur is smiling when the door swings back, so Douglas lets himself relax.

"What is it, Arthur?"

"I brought you this," Arthur says, holding out a box, wrapped in deep blue paper. "I was going to give it to you at the airfield, but you left before I finished the hoovering." He smiles a little more. The thought crosses Douglas's mind that Arthur could break records for smiling. "I never forget a birthday."

Douglas blinks as Arthur pushes the box into his hands. "You didn't say anything about it earlier."

"No. Well." Arthur shuffles his feet. "Mum said that when people don't mention their birthday it means they don't want you to either. But you can't go through the day without a present."

Douglas forces himself to smile, and finds that he doesn't have to force very hard. "Thank you, Arthur."

"You're not mad that I mentioned it?"

"No." Douglas realises he means it – he feels the words in his chest, not just his tongue. "I appreciate it. Really."

Arthur grins wide enough to make Douglas's jaw ache and trips back to his car. Douglas waves to him from the front step, then goes back into the house. He wonders if he should have invited Arthur in for tea, but he's just spent the last nine hours holed in a metal tube with the man. Perhaps he's had enough Arthur for today.

The sound of tearing wrapping paper fills the silent house, and Douglas can't supress a laugh as he pulls a fistful of toblerones out of the box. He should have guessed.

* * *

 **I had a guess at Douglas's age - I'm not sure we ever find out for sure what it is. If someone knows, feel free to tell me and I'll adjust the chapter.**

 **Thanks for reading, feedback welcome.**

 **To be continued.**


	3. Martin

Martin is eleven, and he has a whole cake to himself.

He'd given out so many party invitations that he'd run out of paper and Simon had had to run to the store to get him some more, but the day is here and the house is quiet, full of uneaten triangular sandwiches and undrunk juice. Simon and Catlin had been there at the beginning, but then Simon had gone on his paper round and Catlin had got a call from some friends who were going to the cinema, and now it's just Martin, his parents, the sandwiches and the cake.

Martin reaches a hand out and brushes grey fondant icing. The cake is the shape of an aeroplane – Martin _always_ has an aeroplane cake – piped with the words 'happy birthday Martin!'. He imagines landing a plane one day, a real plane, and his heart leaps at the thought, but there's no-one to talk to it about, so he pushes the feeling back down.

"It's three o'clock," his mum says, coming through from the kitchen. Martin can hear her boring old-person music playing through the open door. She'd promised that she'd turn it off when people arrived. "You should eat something."

Yesterday, when Martin had told her how many invites he'd made, she'd been worried about having so many people around. Now, as Martin watches her reach for a ham sandwich, he can see that worry has gone he knows that she doesn't believe they're coming.

"Perhaps they're just late," he says.

Mum doesn't say anything.

Martin waits to eat until his dad gets home with his box of wires and plyers and hundreds of other things that he tries to get Martin to pay attention to. Martin never listens properly – he's always thinking about how much he has left to read in _Aircraft of the World_ or _Planes and their Parts_. Dad has a sandwich and a bun and tells Martin that perhaps everyone's just busy – "the roads were very clogged today, son, they might not have been able to get here," – but Martin doesn't believe him.

He gets mum to help him cut the cake and wishes, like he wishes every year, to be a pilot when he grows up. The knife slices the word 'Martin' in two, crumbling the piping until there's nothing left of the 'r'.

He eats far too much cake. Usually, mum and dad would never let him eat so much – certainly not without having a vegetable first – but they're too busy talking to each other in the kitchen to notice. They keep their voices low, as if he's sick, and Martin sits at the dining table, cutting slice after slice of cake with the big knife he's not supposed to use, wondering if he'd put the wrong day on the invitations, and knowing that he hadn't. He attacks the sponge runway first, then the wings and finally the tail. Usually he hates cutting the cake, watching the plane get taken away piece by piece, but now he just wants it gone. Looking at it makes him angry.

In the end, mum and dad notice how much Martin's eaten and tell him that's enough and to save some for later, but they don't shout at him like he knows they would have usually. He goes to bed with a stomach ache and wakes up with a worse one, but he doesn't tell anyone. It's his own fault. He knows that.

It takes the five of them almost a whole week to get through all of the party food. The sandwiches go stale and the buns go hard and the cake goes a soggy because the orange juice leaks on it in the fridge, but dad doesn't like to waste food, so they work their way doggedly through it. By the end of the week, the taste of the cake makes Martin want to be sick.

* * *

Martin is thirty-four and his stomach is growling. It's been a bad week – two cancelled van jobs, more flights than usual, rent due. The pasta in the cupboard at home has to last him until his next job on Thursday. He's craving sugar, salt, fruit, chicken – anything that isn't a pasta tube or a stale crust that falls apart in the toaster.

It's a long day flight, which means that he should have had a meal, but there'd been an error with the passenger booking numbers and Carolyn has been forced to give out all of their meals – even her own – to avoid trouble. She's apologetic, but there's nothing to be done until they land. Martin's so hungry he thinks he could have stomached almost anything Arthur served up, but there's nothing in the fridge and the four of them are eking out the eight-hour flight on mints and stale biscuit crumbs.

Douglas's stomach is growling, but it's not making nearly the same amount of noise as Martin's, the loud gurgles that flip-flop nauseatingly in his belly. Douglas probably had a good breakfast – and if he didn't, he certainly had a good meal the night before. Martin is running on fumes; he's almost ready to eat the chair-foam. He's had four cups of tea so far, and he's considering calling Arthur through to make another. A large cup, very hot, with plenty of milk and sugar. It's not real food, but it eases the ache, helps wash down the bitter saliva that keeps gathering under his tongue.

He should pee first, though, before he calls Arthur in again. He passes control to Douglas and makes his way to the loo, dodging around Carolyn in the galley. She's digging in the drawer for lemon hand wipes and muttering under her breath. Martin doesn't stop to ask which unfortunate passenger has been rude to a hungry Carolyn, and then had the stupidity to order a lemon tea.

Both Arthur and Carolyn are amongst the passengers when Martin heads back through to the galley, bladder empty and stomach rumbling. There's a stack of empty trays on the worktop, and one catches Martin's eye.

Cheesecake – a half-slice of cheesecake, tasted but not eaten all up, just sitting there. It'll be cheap and rubbish because this is MJN and everything is cheap and just a little bit rubbish, but Martin has always liked cheesecake and he's hungry enough that the teeth marks don't bother him.

Martin glances around. Douglas can't leave the flight deck until Martin comes back, and Arthur and Carolyn are still dealing with the passengers behind the curtain.

He has a few seconds.

It's his _birthday_.

"Martin?" Carolyn's voice sounds behind him. "Are you alright?"

Martin jumps, spinning to see Carolyn standing behind him, giving him an odd look. For a moment, the words hover on the tip of his tongue – the words 'I'm hungry, I'm sick of pasta, I'm sick of being hungry' – but he doesn't need her knowing that he was planning on picking half-eaten scraps off passenger's trays. She already knows he's pathetic. There's no point in rubbing it in.

"Fine. Fine," he murmurs, and he doesn't even have the energy to stutter. "I'm just heading back through."

Panic rises in his chest as he makes his way back to the flight deck, scrubbing at his mouth to rid it of imaginary crumbs. His ears are red in the way he always hates, his heart hammering in his chest. Douglas doesn't seem to notice, but Martin still spends the rest of the flight expecting Carolyn to burst into the flight deck and ask him what the hell he was doing with the cheesecake.

She doesn't. The flight passes smoothly; Martin takes the landing well, and if it wasn't for his growling stomach and the bitter embarrassment still on his tongue, he might even have considered the trip a good one. He has a few van jobs lined up – next week will be better. He knows that. It's not always like this. It's a bad week – a bad day. And yes, it's his birthday, but no-one knows that. It's not as if they can make it any better if they don't know.

"So," Carolyn says, once the last of the passengers are herded off the plane. "Takeaway anyone?"

"Here?" Arthur sounds both baffled and excited. "On the plane?"

"Well, why not?" Carolyn's voice has an odd grate to it, and when Martin glances up, he realises that she's looking at him. "Thanks to the idiot who booked the flight, none of us have eaten today. I, for one, don't fancy driving home on an empty stomach."

Martin thinks for all of two seconds about how nice it would be to have a birthday meal on a real plane, but then he remembers the price of a takeaway and how soon his rent is due.

"Sorry Carolyn," he says, swallowing saliva and acid. "I have to-"

"My treat," Carolyn says, and she's still looking at him. Martin doesn't want to think about why. He doesn't want to cry.

"Really Carolyn?" Douglas drawls. "Is this it the end of the world? Some kind of last supper?"

Carolyn shoots him a withering look. "Do you want takeaway or not?"

Douglas shuts up. Carolyn gives Martin another look – he doesn't know if it's apologetic, or sympathetic, and he knows he's not going to find out. He doesn't want to, or need to. They're going to eat – they're going to eat together. That's enough.

"So," Carolyn says, looking away at last and clapping her hands. "Indian or Chinese?"

* * *

 **I found this chapter tricky, and I've been wrestling with it for so long that I practically know it off by heart, so I figured it was time to just get it up. Arthur's turn is next, and then a special bonus chapter - three guesses for whose birthday that will be!**

 **Thanks for reading, feedback welcome.**

 **To be continued.**


	4. Arthur

Arthur is ten, and rain is pouring through the roof of the caravan. The sleeping bags are soaked, the floor an inch deep in water. They're eating wet cake for breakfast because Mum can't get the oven to work, and there are spiders clinging to every dry corner they can find.

"This is brilliant, isn't it Mum?"

Mum looks at him in the long, tired way she sometimes does, that Arthur doesn't quite understand. She's wearing her red cagoule over her pyjamas, the hood pulled tight around her hair. Arthur is just letting himself get wet. His raincoat is too small to cover him properly – Dad's been telling him that he needs a new one for months, but they've never got round to going to get one.

"In what way is it brilliant, Arthur?"

"Cake for breakfast! It's just like a holiday."

"It is a holiday. A damp holiday."

Arthur doesn't mind being wet. Camping is brilliant. And he can't help but feel a _little_ relieved that dad's 'business' had stopped him coming with them. Dad is…great, of course dad is great, but sometimes he's a little…well…

He stops thinking about it.

"It's a proper adventure holiday though, isn't it?" Arthur grins. "We could be spies on a stakeout – or pirates in a storm. Or…or treasure hunters, or-"

"Arthur." Mum is still looking at him. "It's alright. You don't have to pretend – I know this isn't what you had in mind when you said you wanted to go camping for your birthday. If you want to go home, I won't be annoyed."

Arthur frowns. "But I mean it, Mum. This is brilliant! He rubs a hand through his wet hair and frowns. "Do _you_ want to go home?"

Mum glances down at the half-slice of soggy cake around on the plastic plate. Water runs off her raincoat and onto the seats, which are damp and spotted with mould that they've covered with carrier bags.

"No, Arthur. You're right. It's brilliant."

Arthur beams.

* * *

Arthur is thirty-one and everything is brilliant, of course it is, because it's his birthday and every birthday is brilliant, even though they've been flying for twelve hours and there's no cake because it got forgotten at the airfield whilst Mum was distracted. Arthur loves flying – he _loves_ – flying – but t's been a very _long_ flight. Arthur is a little tired. Just like the passengers, most of whom seem to be grumpy and not afraid to say so.

He's a little disappointed about the cake, too. It had been a big round one with pieces of toblerone on it. But it's brilliant. It's his birthday. His favourite, along with Easter and Christmas and Mum's birthday and Lent, not to mention Douglas's birthday and Martin's birthday. Birthdays are _always_ brilliant.

Martin makes the landing with only a little bit of bumping and the passengers file off. Arthur does his best to smile at them all as they go, but his face is hurting by the time he reaches passenger sixteen, and when he turns to go hoover the plane, he finds that he doesn't want to. Usually, he loves the hoovering, but for some reason the thought of sucking up crumbs makes him feel annoyed today.

"Arthur…" Mum calls from the galley.

"I know Mum!" he says, trying to sound cheerful. "I'm just getting the hoover."

"Never mind that," Mum sounds annoyed. "Come through here."

Arthur frowns, dragging his feet towards the galley, wondering what he's done wrong that Mum wants him to delay the hoovering to talk about it.

Perhaps she'd noticed that he hadn't smiled as much at the passengers.

"Surprise!"

Arthur jumps, knocking his elbow against the galley wall as Mum, Douglas and Martin jump out from the flight deck. They're wearing brightly-coloured party hats, and Martin blows a party-whistle as Douglas holds up a plastic bowl Arthur recognises from the galley cupboards.

"Happy birthday!" Mum says, coming forward and giving Arthur a hug. "I know it wasn't much fun, but we're going to make it up to you."

"We didn't have a cake," Martin has his party hat balanced precariously on top of his Captain's one, the elastic cutting into his chin. "But we did have-"

"Toblerones," Douglas says, holding out the plastic bowl. The smell of melted chocolate drifts from it. "We've got you other presents of course, but the tolberones were the only ones not in the hold."

Arthur looks into the bowl. Inside is a chocolate mess – melted toblerone with bits of non-melted and half-melted toblerone on top, all mixed with what might be rice-crispies.

"Happy birthday, Arthur," Mum says, and she's looking at him with her eyes kind of crinkled at the edges as if she's worried, and Arthur doesn't know what she needs to be worried about because the melted toblerone smells wonderful – perhaps even better than a cake.

"It's brilliant." Arthur steps forward and gives Mum a hug, grinning at Martin and Douglas over her shoulder. "Thank you."

Douglas steals Martin's party-whistle and blows it so loudly that it makes Arthur's ears ring.

* * *

 **Thanks for reading, feedback welcome!**

 **To be continued.**


	5. GERTI

GERTI is a year old, and her wings are still in mint condition. Her engines run smoothly. Nothing is dirty, or broken. She's in perfect shape.

She'd be content, if it weren't for the shouting. All she ever hears is shouting, and she hates it.

GERTI doesn't know what a divorce is, but she wants it to go away.

* * *

GERTI is…well, that doesn't really matter. The age of an aeroplane is not important, especially once that age starts getting…more mature.

Her wings are a little achy now, and her engines – even the new one – whirr more than they should. Some things are dirty, and a lot are broken. GERTI is no longer in the shape that she used to be, but then again, she's no year-old model any more. She's put in a lot of time.

There's still shouting. But now there's laughter, too – and crying, and talking in quiet voices, in a way that doesn't make GERTI wish the whole world would just fall silent.

GERTI is getting old. She knows that. But for them – for the four of them who talk and cry and argue and _laugh_ – she carries on.

* * *

 **That's all folks - kudos to katiedz who guessed correctly that the bonus chapter would be GERTI's. Thank you to everyone who said they enjoyed this story, it always makes me smile.**

 **I have a Christmassy Cabin Pressure fic lined up, so watch this space!**

 **The end!**


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